December 4, 2006

Analyse this: MATTHEW BRODERICK

By Elaine Lipworth, Daily Mail

Actor Matthew Broderick, 44, lives in New York with his wife, actress Sarah Jessica Parker and their four year-old son James. Broderick starred in Mel Brooks' musical hit The Producers both on stage on film.

His films include the classic, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Election, Inspector Gadget and Godzilla. His latest project is Deck The Halls, in which he plays a controlling optician who clashes with his fun loving, uncouth - and distinctly lower class - neighbor Danny DeVito, over Christmas. It is released on 1 December.

What is your idea of heaven?

When I'm working on something that I love and it is going well, that makes me extremely happy. I like to work and I'm not happy if I don't work for a long time. I get irritable.

But I'm also very happy just being at home with my family - my wife Sarah and our son - doing very little. I also love going top our beautiful places in Long Island and Ireland.

I don't mind the weather at all. Just being with friends and family and plenty of good food - that's all I need.

What were your dreams as a child?

When I was very little I wanted to be an actor, I loved being in theatres with my father. I remember the night before Christmas one year, watching my father set up a train set, not knowing that I was watching him - so that was my first major acting role, I had to open the box the next morning and be surprised and be like "Oh my God a train". It was funny. He didn’t catch on.

Would you let your son James go into show business?

I wouldn't do anything to encourage or discourage him, it will be up to him what he ends up doing, just like it was with me.

My father was an actor and luckily he didn't encourage or discourage me. He just supported me. Then when I started to get work and he thought I was good at it and saw that I could make a living, he was very happy. You just take it one step at a time.

Are you shopaholic or shop shy?

I don't shop much for myself, I like shopping for my son – although he has everything. He's obsessed with Scooby Doo at the moment so I can get him anything at all connected with Scooby Doo and he’s happy.

Sarah is good at shopping obviously but it's hard shopping for my wife, I can't buy her clothes - forget it. Apart from being fashionable and stylish, people just give her things, she gets everything free.

I don't know what to give her for Christmas, it's very stressful each year. I buy her jewellery. I do feel pressure to get the right things but I would never get her an outfit, maybe I'll get her pajamas with feet.

Have you ever had a horrendous neighbor like Danny De Vito's character Buddy Hall?

I have been more like Danny's character, annoying other people. I've had neighbors saying "my god you did your washing at 8 o clock at night".

We live in New York and people get angry and mad at nothing at all. I had a neighbor who was angry because we did a little construction in our house and it made a crack in his wall.

He didn't call and say "there is a crack in our wall", he called and said: "I am a professor at the NYU (New York University) law school, you have made a crack in my wall, I think you had better call me back."

He immediately wanted to go to court over the matter. So we went next door and tried to pacify him and plaster the crack.

What has been your greatest challenge?

Everything in life is a challenge. Work is always challenging and I try to keep it that way by doing things I’m not good at - in this film I had to learn how to speed skate. Apart from work, having a child is very challenging.

Before you have children there is no way of knowing what it will be like, and no getting ready for the experience of being a parent. And I'm just at the beginning of that because my son is only four. I know when they get to be teenagers it is quite terrible.

What is your biggest extravagance?

We splash out on entertaining at Christmas - we definitely like to have nice parties for friends and family with very good champagne - that is our biggest indulgence.

Rich and famous or poor anonymous?

Well we're very lucky to have our life and I wouldn't change it. The fame can get to you in New York - when Sarah and I go out together we get followed until they get bored and give up, but if I go out alone without my wife nobody cares.

What was the defining moment when you realised you were famous?

I did a couple of big Broadway hits that meant I was quite well known in New York, but the film Ferris Bueller's Day Off really changed everything and took my career and life to another level.

I remember feeling "wow" when I was at a huge screening of the film in New York one evening with my family. We sat in the back of a packed theatre and the audience went absolutely bananas and it really felt like a big moment.

I felt great but I felt it was all bigger than me, the movie was catching on in some extraordinary way that was beyond anything anyone had planned for and everyone knew who I was.

Do you have a guilty pleasure?

Cigarettes. I know I shouldn't smoke but I do like them once in a while, I enjoy smoking. I've given up at the moment - I go back and forth. It's very hard and I don't know whether I'll make it.

What's your biggest regret?

I don't have regrets – or if I do about not doing a film or doing a bad one, I just move on and try to forget it because I don't think they are useful so I try not to dwell on them. You have to just keep playing your hand there’s no point in having regrets.